Friday, February 9, 2018

The cover for my upcoming book

I discovered the delights of contact steamed printing with leaves and other plant materials when I took a workshop with Leslie Marsh this fall through the San Diego Book Arts group.

I took this workshop specifically to learn Leslie's methods to compliment my burgeoning interest in nature printing. Although I have been making letterpress prints for some time of botanical specimens I wanted to print directly from plant material.

The new book I'm working on is about a particular ancient Valley oak tree I visit on my daily walks on the trails near my home in Simi Valley, CA. There is a companion volume planned about other similar trees in the surrounding area.

I collected fallen leaves to print the cover and some interior pages using a process sometimes called "eco-printing" which is commonly done on protein-based fabric. I was interested in using cellulose fiber (paper) for my project.



fallen leaves  


The leaves are soaked in water 


 the leaves are placed damp paper and rolled on pipe and tied


I use an electric turkey roaster to cook the bundles



finished prints are hung on a line in my backyard


the results 


No comments:

Post a Comment